Deconstructing Games: The Trail

Conference Archive

FocusOn Learning 2017 Conference & Expo - June 20, 2017

Valary Oleinik

Deconstructing Games is a new series of hands-on sessions where you’ll have the opportunity to play a game and then discuss how the mechanics in play can be applied in your own learning context.

Session Description:In The Trail, you set out as a pioneer on a long journey across an unknown countryside. Your mission is to reach the town of Eden Falls, but along the way you have to explore, collect items, learn to craft things to help you survive, and create items you can trade. But reaching town is only the end of the first phase of your journey.

In this session, you’ll examine how The Trail game concept could apply to onboarding a learner to a new environment and how to offer clear short-term and long-term objectives and a personalized experience through the choice of challenges and a customized storyline. The game also reminds us that repetition must be meaningful, not just redundant, in order to keep learners engaged.